“No. I’m not saying that at all. Frederick and Marlissa came to America a couple of years before the war started.”
“Then I don’t see the connection. He didn’t return to Germany?”
“They both remained in America. He worked, sometimes at the Ford estate, and Marlissa wintered on Sanibel. Sometimes spent the entire year. Here, in this house. They wanted to be married.
“According to Marlissa’s diary, Freddy—that’s the way she referred to him sometimes, ‘Freddy’—he was determined to make a fortune so her family would accept him.” Chestra’s tone became sardonic. “Money is the great unifier, is it not? It’s the only religion that offers heaven on earth.”
Roth believed that Florida real estate was the fastest way to get rich, she told me. During those years, fishing and farming were the main sources of income in the area, supplemented by tourism. Farmland was valuable, bay frontage less so, but it was still much preferred to beachfront.
Because I knew it was true, I nodded as she said, “Apparently, locals thought beach frontage was worthless. It was sandy, hot, buggy. A garden won’t grow near a beach, and you can’t dock a boat because of the waves.”
Tourists liked beaches, though, which is why Roth began to buy up inexpensive beachfront anywhere in Florida he could find it.
“In her diary, Marlissa wrote that Freddy owned ‘miles and miles of the stuff.’ He bought waterfront for as little as ten dollars an acre, and seldom more than fifty dollars an acre. Marlissa kept very accurate records.”
I said, “I don’t understand.”
“Marlissa wanted Frederick to become rich so they could marry. So she loaned him the money. That’s why she kept records. She had an inheritance, and our families have always been…comfortable. Fifty dollars for an acre of beach may not sound like much now, but Frederick was hired help. He made a buck a day.
“I see. He was a hardworking guy in love with an heiress. I still don’t understand, though, why you think there’s a link between the artifacts we found and your godmother’s lover?”
The woman shrugged, and swept her scarf through the air, frustrated. “Oh…I don’t know. Wistful thinking, I guess. Silly hopes? They are from the same era.” She looked toward the balcony again where wind moved the curtains, bare trees visible out there in the darkness.
Theatrical? Once again, I got that impression. The woman could be frank at times, but she also maintained a distance. Drama was an effective shield.
Chestra wasn’t telling me everything. Why? She seemed to lead me close to the truth in the hope I’d provide my own answers. Or that I would discover information that she possessed but didn’t want to share.
I provided her with a possible explanation now. “The fact that Frederick Roth lived in Florida during the war doesn’t mean he wasn’t a Nazi. He could have been a sympathizer. Or an operative sent to gather intelligence for the German regime.” I was referring to the brotherhood I know so well.
I looked at the photo again: an athletic young man serving drinks to two of the most powerful men in America. Add to the mix the famous names Arlis had mentioned: John L. Lewis, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Edna St. Vincent Millay—all of them living or vacationing on the same rural coastline, in the relaxed atmosphere of palms and surf.
Why hadn’t I thought of it before? During that era, Sanibel was an ideal location to drop an intelligence officer. Infiltrate the local social structure, find the sort of job that allowed him to eavesdrop on conversations. Rifle personal papers and appointment calendars while his powerful employers swam or fished. Perfect. A smart operative could blend in for years, generating a quality of intelligence worthy of a diamond pin. How the German military got the medal into the agent’s hand was problematic. But not impossible.
Chestra was silent for a moment, her expression troubled—her godmother’s lover was a Nazi?
“I’ve always thought it was extremely unlikely that Frederick worked for the Germans. Quite the opposite, in fact, from what Marlissa wrote about him. Which is why I never gave it serious consideration until…now. Until Tommy told me what you’d found. Medals and diamonds and coins, all from that time period. It’s too coincidental.”
I asked, “What did you read in your godmother’s diary that made you believe he wasn’t a Nazi sympathizer?”
Chestra gave me a sadder version of her I told you, it’s romantic look. “Because Marlissa was doing something else that wasn’t considered proper during the time. Particularly for a wealthy young woman of her class. Frederick Roth was a Jew. He didn’t advertise it—working for Henry Ford? But it’s there in her writings.”
20
Bern Heller sat in the marina’s business office, still queasy from being seasick, looking at a computer screen in the late-night quiet, his condition not improved by what he had just read:
At the request of Swiss authorities, Nazi Adolf Eichmann required that all Jewish passports must be stamped with a large red letter “J.” It was not only to restrict Jews from emigrating to Switzerland. The infamous red “J” was also a way of identifying Jews who wanted to leave Germany, so they could then be diverted to death camps…
Bern couldn’t believe it. Didn’t want to believe. He read the same paragraph several times.
He’d brought a few items from the briefcase, including the old man’s earliest passport, the one with the swastika embossed on its green cover. He had Googled a few key words, then opened an Internet article that included a photo of a German passport that also had a swastika embossed on its cover.
The passport was identical to his grandfather’s: Nazi eagle, and the word REISPASS on the inside cover. Stamped on the word was an oversized J. J for Jew. The passport had been issued to a woman, but everything else was the same.
Bern opened his grandfather’s passport and checked again. There it was, a big red letter J on the page opposite the old man’s name and photograph. Frederick B. Roth, issued 1938, Berlin. Just like the passport on the computer screen. Hard to believe that the J didn’t stand for jerk, knowing his grandfather. But Bern couldn’t argue with history, which was right here staring him in the face.
A Jew? My grandfather was a Jew?
Bern thought: Perfect. I spend the day puking, wanting to die. Now this.
Shock and self-pity, his first reaction. A dizzy unreal feeling. Then he began to think about it.
His grandfather was a Jew? No way. There had to be another explanation.
The Internet article contained more photos—peasant faces with graveyard eyes; skeletons covered with skin. There was also an article. Bern reread portions of it now, hoping to find something that would hint at another explanation. Had to be one: Nobody hated Jews more than Grandpa Freddy.
…Hitler was determined to solve what he called the “Jewish problem” (Judenfrage), and put Eichmann in charge of Zionist Affairs. On August 17, 1938, legislation forced German Jews to adopt the middle name of either “Israel” or “Sarah” if the bearer did not already have a very distinct Jewish name—
Bern paused to look inside the passport again, seeing Frederick B. Roth written there, signature below. He didn’t know what the B stood for, but at least it wasn’t Israel. Was there a distinctive Jewish name that began with B?